Download or read book Towards an International Code of Conduct for Private Security Providers written by Anne-Marie Buzatu and published by Ubiquity Press. This book was released on 2015-09-19 with total page 61 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The use of private security companies (PSCs) to provide security services has been on the rise since the end of the Cold War, with PSCs operating in a number of contexts, including armed conflict and areas where the rule of law has been compromised. The use of private actors to perform services that are traditionally associated with the state is not limited to PSCs, but is emblematic of a growing trend by governments to outsource functions with a view to improving efficiency and cutting budgets. Privatization of public functions can, however, present a number of challenges to existing national and international regulatory and oversight frameworks. In the private security sector these challenges were brought to international attention after high-profile incidents in which PSCs injured civilians revealed difficulties in effectively holding international PSCs accountable. This paper argues that crafting a multistakeholder regulatory approach in which key stakeholders work together to develop standards that are appropriately adapted for the private sector, as well as to create governance and oversight mechanisms to hold these private actors to effective account, helps to fill some of the governance gaps found in traditional regulatory approaches. It recounts the developments leading to the International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers (ICOC) and its governance and oversight mechanism, the ICOC Association, offering an example of the development of an initiative which sets new international standards and elaborates a multistakeholder framework and approach to governance for the private security sector. A recent trend of state and non-state clients requiring compliance with the ICOC initiative in their contracts with PSCs offers a new take on binding international regulation of private actors.

Download or read book The Legal Regime Applicable to Private Military and Security Company Personnel in Armed Conflicts written by Mohamad Ghazi Janaby and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-08-31 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates the modern privatisation of war. It specifically focuses on the legal regime regulating private military and security company (PMSC) personnel in armed conflicts. The law regulating PMSC personnel is analysed from two perspectives. Firstly, can one of the three following legal statuses established by international humanitarian law – “mercenary”, “combatant” or “civilian” – be applied to PMSC personnel? Secondly, the book employs a context-dependent methodology to explore the legal regime regulating PMSC personnel. It argues that the legal regime regulating PMSC personnel in armed conflicts depends on who hires them: individual states, the United Nations, non-governmental organisations, or armed groups. This approach represents a departure from previous literature, where attention has primarily been paid to the use of PMSCs by states.

Download or read book Private Security and Identity Politics written by Jutta Joachim and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-07-18 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the self-representation and identity politics of Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs). PMSCs have become increasingly important over the past few decades. While their boom is frequently explained in functional terms, such as their cost-efficiency and effectiveness, this book offers an alternative explanation based on an analysis of the online self-presentations of forty-two US- and UK-based companies. PMSCs are shaping how they are perceived and establishing themselves as acceptable and legitimate security actors by eclectically appropriating identities more commonly associated with the military, businesses and humanitarian actors. Depending on their audience and clients’ needs, they can be professional hero warriors, or promise turn-key security solutions based on their exceptional expertise, or, in a similar way to humanitarians, reassure those in need of relief and try to make the world a better place. Rather than being merely public relations, the self-referential assertions of PMSCs are political. Not only do they contribute to a normalization of private security and reinforce an already ongoing blurring of lines between the public and private sectors, they also change what we deem to be ‘security’ and a ‘security actor’. This book will be of much interest to students of private military companies, critical security studies, military studies, security studies and IR.

Download or read book Private Security Contractors and New Wars written by Kateri Carmola and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-02-05 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book addresses the ambiguities of the growing use of private security contractors and provides guidance as to how our expectations about regulating this expanding ‘service’ industry will have to be adjusted. In the warzones of Iraq and Afghanistan many of those who carry weapons are not legally combatants, nor are they protected civilians. They are contracted by governments, businesses, and NGOs to provide armed security. Often mistaken as members of armed forces, they are instead part of a new protean proxy force that works alongside the military in a multitude of shifting roles, and overseen by a matrix of contracts and regulations. This book analyzes the growing industry of these private military and security companies (PMSCs) used in warzones and other high risk areas. PMSCs are the result of a unique combination of circumstances, including a change in the idea of soldiering, insurance industry analyses that require security contractors, and a need for governments to distance themselves from potentially criminal conduct. The book argues that PMSCs are a unique type of organization, combining attributes from worlds of the military, business, and humanitarian organizations. This makes them particularly resistant to oversight. The legal status of these companies and those they employ is also hard to ascertain, which weakens the multiple regulatory tools available. PMSCs also fall between the cracks in ethical debates about their use, seeming to be both justifiable and objectionable. This transformation in military operations is a seemingly irreversible product of more general changes in the relationship between the individual citizen and the state. This book will be of much interest to students of private security companies, war and conflict studies, security studies and IR in general. Kateri Carmola is the Christian A. Johnson Professor of Political Science at Middlebury College in Vermont. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Download or read book Private Military and Security Companies PMSCs and the Quest for Accountability written by George Andreopoulos and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-03-18 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs) have constituted a perennial feature of the security landscape. Yet, it is their involvement in and conduct during the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that have transformed the outsourcing of security services into such a pressing public policy and world-order issue. The PMSCs’ ubiquitous presence in armed conflict situations, as well as in post-conflict reconstruction, their diverse list of clients (governments in the developed and developing world, non-state armed groups, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, and international corporations) and, in the context of armed conflict situations, involvement in instances of gross misconduct, have raised serious accountability issues. The prominence of PMSCs in conflict zones has generated critical questions concerning the very concept of security and the role of private force, a rethinking of "essential governmental functions," a rearticulation of the distinction between public/private and global/local in the context of the creation of new forms of "security governance," and a consideration of the relevance, as well as limitations, of existing regulatory frameworks that include domestic and international law (in particular international human rights law and international humanitarian law). This book critically examines the growing role of PMSCs in conflict and post-conflict situations, as part of a broader trend towards the outsourcing of security functions. Particular emphasis is placed on key moral, legal, and political considerations involved in the privatization of such functions, on the impact of outsourcing on security governance, and on the main challenges confronting efforts to hold PMSCs accountable through a combination of formal and informal, domestic as well as international, regulatory mechanisms and processes. It will be of interest to scholars, policymakers, practitioners and advocates for a more transparent and humane security order. This book was published as a special issue of Criminal Justice Ethics.

Download or read book Private Anti Piracy Navies written by John J. Pitney and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2013-12-12 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The twenty-first century has seen a sharp rise in privatization of the military, especially of logistics and security functions during the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The outbreak of Somali piracy that started in 2008 has prompted a similar revolution in maritime security. Private security companies began operating armed escort vessels to protect merchant shipping against pirates off the Horn of Africa. Private Anti-Piracy Navies is intended to provide a contextualized understanding of the historical origins, current state, and future prospects of this fast-changing sector. Centuries ago, the British East India Company used a private navy against piracy in the same waters with much success. Yet since then, international law has evolved to more tightly regulate the use of force by civilians, and to afford greater protections to suspected pirates. Thus, the development of what are in effect private warships has presented numerous legal and regulatory problems. How can the companies that operate these vessels be effectively licensed? Under what circumstances should they be allowed to use lethal force? This book explains how regulators in industry and government have attempted to answer such questions, and highlights the remaining areas of uncertainty. It also addresses the economic factors that drive the struggle between pirates and anti-piracy forces. Of equal concern are operational considerations such as defensive tactics, logistics, and rules of engagement. Security companies must carefully balance rights concerns against the need to defend ships effectively. Partly due to the contribution of private security, piracy in the Indian Ocean has dropped significantly over the past two years, leading to widespread overconfidence. Governments under severe budget pressure may withdraw their naval task forces from the region prematurely, leading to a resurgence of Somali piracy. At the same time, pirates are wreaking havoc in the Gulf of Guinea off West Africa. The book concludes with an assessment of private naval forces’ prospects in these conflicts over the short term, as well as the implications for wider naval privatization in the long run.

Download or read book Multilevel Regulation of Military and Security Contractors written by Christine Bakker and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2012-02-10 with total page 664 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The outsourcing of military and security services is the object of intense legal debate. States employ private military and security companies (PMSCs) to perform functions previously exercised by regular armed forces, and increasingly international organisations, NGOs and business corporations do the same to provide security, particularly in crisis situations. Much of the public attention on PMSCs has been in response to incidents in which PMSC employees have been accused of violating international humanitarian law. Therefore initiatives have been launched to introduce uniform international standards amidst what is currently very uneven national regulation. This book analyses and discusses the interplay between international, European, and domestic regulatory measures in the field of PMSCs. It presents a comprehensive assessment of the existing domestic legislation in EU Member States and relevant Third States, and identifies implications for future international regulation. The book also addresses the crucial questions whether and how the EU can potentially play a more active future role in the regulation of PMSCs to ensure compliance with human rights and international humanitarian law.

Download or read book Private Military and Security Companies as Legitimate Governors written by Berenike Prem and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2019-06-19 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the legitimation of Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs), focusing on the controversy between PMSCs and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). While existing studies disproportionately emphasizes the ability for companies and their clients to dominate and shape perceptions of the industry, this book offers an alternative explanation for the oft-cited normalization of PMSCs and the trend to privatize security by analyzing the changing relationship between PMSCs and NGOs. It uses the concept of ‘norm entrepreneurship’ to elucidate the legitimation game between these two dissimilar actors. Starting from the 1990s, the book shows that the relationship between PMSCs and NGOs has undergone a transition by literally moving from ‘the barricades to the boardrooms’. After years of fierce advocacy and PR campaigns against PMSCs, today both actors increasingly collaborate in multi-stakeholder initiatives, elevating the status of PMSCs from a scorned actor to a trusted partner in the regulation of the industry. The work offers a comprehensive explanation of when and why this kind of collective norm entrepreneurship is likely to occur. This book will be of interest to students of PMSCs, critical security studies, global governance, international norms, and International Relations.

Download or read book International Humanitarian Law written by Emily Crawford and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-03-12 with total page 387 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides an accessible, scholarly, and up-to-date examination of international humanitarian law.

Download or read book Digest of United States Practice in International Law 2010 written by Elizabeth R. Wilcox and published by . This book was released on 2012-01-27 with total page 944 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Co-published by Oxford University Press and the International Law Institute, and prepared by the Office of the Legal Adviser at the Department of State, the Digest of United States Practice in International Law presents an annual compilation of documents and commentary highlighting significant developments in public and private international law, and is an invaluable resource for practitioners and scholars in the field. Each edition compiles excerpts from documents such as treaties, diplomatic notes and correspondence, legal opinion letters, judicial decisions, Senate committee reports and press releases. Each document is selected by members of the Legal Adviser's Office of the U.S. Department of State, based on their judgments about the significance of the issues, their potential relevance to future situations, and their likely interest to scholars and practitioners. In almost every case, the commentary to each excerpt is accompanied by a citation to the full text. The 2010 edition of the Digest covers various developments that occurred during the course of the year, including issues relating to the active engagement of the U.S. with the International Criminal Court and the first full year of U.S. participation as a member of the Human Rights Council. Also discussed is U.S. involvement with notable treaties (including the New START Treaty and the Hague Convention on International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance, to both of which the U.S. Senate gave its advice and consent to ratification during 2010). Other subjects covered include U.S. activities at the United Nations and important judicial decisions from 2010.

Download or read book Private Military and Security Contractors written by Gary Schaub, Jr. and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2016-06-16 with total page 440 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Private Military and Security Contractors (PMSCs) a multinational team of scholars and experts address a developing phenomenon: controlling the use of privatized force by states in international politics. Robust analyses of the evolving, multi-layered tapestry of formal and informal mechanisms of control address the microfoundations of the market, such as the social and role identities of contract employees, their acceptance by military personnel, and potential tensions between them. The extent and willingness of key states—South Africa, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Israel—to monitor and enforce discipline to structure their contractual relations with PMSCs on land and at sea is examined, as is the ability of the industry to regulate itself. Also discussed is the nascent international legal regime to reinforce state and industry efforts to encourage effective practices, punish inappropriate behavior, and shape the market to minimize the hazards of loosening states’ oligopolistic control over the means of legitimate organized violence. The volume presents a theoretically-informed synthesis of micro- and macro-levels of analysis, offering new insights into the challenges of controlling the agents of organized violence used by states for scholars and practitioners alike.

Download or read book Design in Maritime Engineering written by Azman Ismail and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-02-15 with total page 473 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book covers several research outcomes of various fields and schools related to maritime operation, applications and materials science. Thirty-four research papers have been compiled from the 2nd International Conference on Marine and Advanced Technologies 2021 (ICMAT 2021) which was organized by the Research and Innovation Section of the Universiti Kuala Lumpur-MIMET. The chapters were written by experienced lecturers from various universities in Malaysia discussing various topics and sub-topics related to maritime engineering and materials science. These chapters portray the actual knowledge on the latest developments and trends of technologies in maritime industries.

Download or read book Routledge Handbook of the Law of Armed Conflict written by Rain Liivoja and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-28 with total page 722 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The law of armed conflict is a key element of the global legal order yet it finds itself in a state of flux created by the changing nature of warfare and the influences of other branches of international law. The Routledge Handbook of the Law of Armed Conflict provides a unique perspective on the field covering all the key aspects of the law as well as identifying developing and often contentious areas of interest. The handbook will feature original pieces by international experts in the field, including academics, staff of relevant NGOs and (former) members of the armed forces. Made up of six parts in order to offer a comprehensive overview of the field, the structure of the handbook is as follows: Part I: Fundamentals Part II: Principle of distinction Part III: Means and methods of warfare Part IV: Special protection regimes Part V: Compliance and enforcement Part VI: Some contemporary issues Throughout the book, attention is paid to non-international conflicts as well as international conflicts with acknowledgement of the differences. The contributors also consider the relationship between the law of armed conflict and human rights law, looking at how the various rules and principles of human rights law interact with specific rules and principles of international humanitarian law in particular circumstances. The Routledge Handbook of the Law of Armed Conflict provides a fresh take on the contemporary laws of war and is written for advanced level students, academics, researchers, NGOs and policy-makers with an interest in the field.

Download or read book The Law in War written by Geoffrey S. Corn and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-03-28 with total page 455 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Law in War offers an insightful roadmap to understanding a broad range of operational, humanitarian, and accountability issues that arise during armed conflict. Each chapter provides a clear and comprehensive explanation of the impact that international law has on military operations. The second edition has been fully revised to reflect recent advances in international humanitarian law and expands the analysis to include as a brand-new chapter on international human rights law, which addresses issues such as the conduct of law enforcement during hostilities. With a particular focus on updates concerning the status of combatants and unprivileged belligerents, the protection of civilians, targeting, the treatment of POWs and detainees, weapons law, air and missile warfare, naval warfare and neutrality, command responsibility, and accountability. New material has also been added to address the increasing involvement of private security contractors in warfare. The Law in War is an ideal text for students in a variety of domains, to include international humanitarian law, international human rights law, international relations, and military science. It is also a valuable resource for those involved in the planning, execution, and critique of military operations across the spectrum of conflict.

Download or read book Texts and Materials on International Human Rights written by Rhona K.M. Smith and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2019-11-05 with total page 805 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Texts and Materials on International Human Rights offers a carefully tailored overview of the subject that covers sources and theories, institutions and structures, and substantive rights. The fourth edition is fully updated to include all key developments in the law, in particular issues around reform in the UN and the topical application of human rights around the world. This collection of materials offers a comprehensive overview of the institutional structures relevant to international human rights law, crucial to the understanding of how law works in this challenging area. Designed to guide students through the fundamental texts for this subject, the author’s commentary contextualises each extract to explain its relevance, while highlighted further reading makes links to cutting-edge academic commentary to provide next steps for student research. Offering a clear text design that distinguishes between materials and author commentary, and including reflective questions throughout to aid understanding, this book is ideal for students seeking to engage with the key issues in the study of international human rights.

Download or read book Money for Mayhem written by Alessandro Arduino and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2023-10-15 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gazes into the crystal ball to forecast what the future of war looks like in a world dominated by private armies. The way war is waged is evolving quickly—igniting the rapid rise of private military contractors who offer military-style services as part of their core business model. When private actors take up state security, their incentives are not to end war and conflict but to manage the threat only enough to remain relevant. Arduino unpacks the tradeoffs involved when conflict is increasingly waged by professional outfits that thrive on chaos rather than national armies. This book charts the rise of private military actors from Russia, China, and the Middle East using primary source data, in-person interviews, and field research amongst operations in conflict zones around the world. Individual stories narrated by mercenaries, military trainers, security entrepreneurs, hackers, and drone pilots are used to introduce themes throughout. Arduino concludes by considering today’s trajectories in the deployment of mercenaries by states, corporations, or even terrorist organizations and what it will mean for the future of conflict. The book follows private security contractors that take on missions in different countries with a variety of challenges. First-hand data and intimate knowledge of the actors involved in the market for force allow a fully grounded narrative with personal input. Through this prism, readers will gain a better understanding of the human, security, and political risks that are part of this industry. The book specifically reveals the risk that unaccountable mercenaries pose in increasing the threshold for conflict, the threat to traditional military forces, the corruption in political circles, and the rising threat of proxy conflicts in the US rivalry with China and Russia.

Download or read book Hired Guns and Human Rights written by Kuzi Charamba and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2020-10-30 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This innovative book provides an overview and critical assessment of the current avenues and remedies available to victims seeking recourse from private military and security companies (PMSCs) for human rights violations.